Var. _paleaceum_, Mettenius:—Frond ample, two to three feet long, stalk and rachis very chaffy with ferruginous or blackish scales; segments oblong, truncate, nearly entire on the margins; indusium coriaceous, the edges much incurved, sometimes splitting in two.—Aspidium, p. 55; Milde, Fil. Eur. Atl., p. 121.—_Lastrea Filix-mas_, var. _paleacea_, Moore, l.c.—_Aspidium paleaceum_, Don, “Prodr. Fl. Nepal., p. 4;” Fournier, Pl. Mex., Crypt., p. 92. _Aspidium parallelogrammum_, Kunze, in Linnæa, xiii., p. 146, etc.—_Nephrodium Filix-mas_, var. _parallelogrammum_, Hooker, Sp. Fil., iv., p. 116.—_Dichasium parallelogrammum_ and _D. patentissimum_, Fée, Gen. Fil., p. 302, t. xxiii, _B._—_Lastrea truncata_, Brackenridge, Fil. of U. S. Expl. Exped., p. 195, t. 27 (admirable).[1] Hab.—In one form or another, this species occurs in America from Greenland to Peru, throughout Europe and Asia, in parts of Africa, and in many islands of the ocean. The ordinary European form corresponding to Moore’s plate XIV has been collected in British Columbia by Dr. Lyall, in Keweenaw Peninsula of Northern Michigan by Dr. Robbins, and in the mountains of Colorado by Messrs. Hall & Harbour and Mr. Brandegee. Var. _incisum_ was found at the base of calcareous rocks at Royston Park, Owen Sound, Ontario, Canada, by Mrs. Roy, and in the mountains of Colorado by Dr. Scovill, for one of whose specimens I am indebted to D. A. Watt, Esq., of Montreal. Fragments of apparently the same form have been received from Dakota. The Californian plant mentioned in Plantæ Hartwegianæ, p. 342, is better regarded as a form of _Aspidium rigidum_. Var. _paleaceum_ has not been found in either Canada or the United States, but is well known in Mexico, in Europe, in Southern Asia, in the Hawaiian Islands, etc. Description:—This fern has a stout, usually ascending, but sometimes erect, very chaffy root-stock, very much like that of the species last described. It sometimes rises a little above the surface of the ground, forming a short trunk.